Insect Tamer's Ascension-Chapter 418. The guilt of death and a new start

Time passed, and Theo learned many things about the affinity from Scholar Vale.

One of them was the spatial arts. While Theo didn’t truly need them, he could still understand the fundamentals, knowledge that had been passed down for ages.

Using all that he had learned, Theo tried to restore his sense of balance, returning his center of gravity to normal again, which needed a great deal of focused meditation.

The arts, however, were not some kind of magic humans could freely perform. When Theo first heard of them, he imagined himself unleashing spatial slashes with his sword.

But the reality was far less flashy than his imagination.

The arts were more like martial arts; they were methods used to refine, maintain, and better utilize one’s natural affinity, nothing more.

And for Theo, that was exactly what he needed right now.

He needed to gain control over his own body.

They trained in these arts for a full week, all while also devising ways to use the ants in a more efficient way.

During that time, the second and third ant queens were finally partially tamed and assimilated into the colony.

They had been a tough nut to crack, but once Theo’s ant queen managed to dominate their Hive Link with its own, something magical happened.

When Theo entered the Hive Link afterward, instead of seeing just a single beacon like he usually did for a moment after entering the Hive Link, there were now two more similar beacons.

These two new beacons hovered at the edges of the Hive Link, with nothing really attached to them.

According to the ant queen, they were supposed to start laying eggs for the normal shardjaw ant brood again.

Theo found the idea disappointing. In this new colony, there was little use for the normal shardjaw ants anymore.

And the ant queen also mentioned that the males from its side would soon begin inseminating the new ant queens, which could help them to establish their own new brood.

But there was a major problem with that.

One of which was the fact that the brood of the newer generations had grown far larger – too large for these two newly assimilated ant queens to let them lay eggs safely.

Theo left what would happen to the new ones in the ant queen’s control and chose not to interfere further.

Instead, he only focused on the Hive Link, which had grown a little too exhausting since the addition of two more ant queens. It felt as though the pressure increased.

By the end of that week, the crawler finally found a safe and suitable location for the colony within the moss slime territory.

When Theo went to inspect the area, he noticed there were no more than a few moss slimes present in the territory.

But he knew better than to take that variable seriously when looking at things.

The moss slime multiplied rapidly once they matured, so what seemed like a few could become dozens overnight.

But Theo didn’t mind that.

He relocated the entire colony into the forest and stayed there for several days by himself, personally guarding them to ensure there were no casualties.

Once the ants had finally settled underground, Theo could see through their eyes just how quickly the newer generation could dig through the soil.

After making sure that everything was stable and that the Hive Link still functioned even from the castle, Theo did his best to resume the Hive Link training.

Scholar Vale taught him in the afternoons. Rhys trained him in the mornings. And at night, Theo focused on training the Hive Link.

Life felt intensely busy for that whole time, but every part of it felt important.

It was during this time that Theo started noticing something else.

Everyone in the castle seemed unusually motivated.

The servants were striving to rise in rank and had applied to become higher servants. The knights were training even during their free time, seeking advice to improve their aura.

The heirs, especially the older ones, were constantly in talk everywhere.

Lucien spent nearly all his time training with a sword since all that was needed was to train the panther to be worthy of level 10 and then have a breakthrough.

Cedric’s achievements at the knight academy were being talked about throughout the castle.

Meanwhile, for the first time, Elara was training her beast in the proper way.

Isolde had obtained her merchant license during that time as well, making her the first merchant to officially represent the family. 𝚏𝕣𝕖𝚎𝚠𝚎𝚋𝚗𝐨𝐯𝕖𝕝.𝕔𝐨𝕞

She was now in direct contact with the baroness, helping move goods around and securing better deals. As a result, the barony was slowly growing richer.

The twins had started entering the forest as well, training hard in hopes of earning their father’s approval, something that was difficult to get with so many overachievers in the family.

Bram, however, was the only one on a completely different path. There was no mention of what he was doing or how he was faring. Still, Theo knew in his heart that Bram was doing what he truly loved.

Another week passed with the same routine of training, and it was finally time for Scholar Vale to go back for a while.

In the end, the scholar couldn’t help but say as they bade him farewell, "You have opened my eyes, Young Theo. The first thing I will do after going back is research ants and other beasts like them. Many thanks."

Theo, in turn, couldn’t help but thank the man for helping him refine his body adaptation.

And for opening his eyes about the revolution of insect taming.

But during this time, a few unfortunate things also happened. One of the first insects he ever got, the scorpion, died as its lifespan came to an end.

That day, Theo felt a kind of guilt he had never experienced before. He could have added the scorpion to the partial taming and then integrated it into the colony.

But with so much to do, he had completely forgotten about it.

He remembered all the times the scorpion had been by his side during the feeding session in the terrarium, deep within the cave of the large terrarium. Now, that cave felt empty, like it had lost its owner.

Theo tried his best to move past this feeling, wanting to make up for his mistakes.

Then Clara did something unexpected.

She ordered another scorpion of the same species, one that was still very young, having just been born.

The moment Theo saw it, he knew what he had to do. He immediately entered into a partial taming with it, and from that day on, the colony once again had a guardian stationed near the entrance of their home.